Red Sky In Early Evening

If you’re going to be around Dublin city centre next Thursday, April 25th, you could do a lot worse than get along to Dubray Books on Grafton Street at 6.30pm, where Paul Lynch will be launching his debut novel, RED SKY IN MORNING (Quercus).
  Opening in Donegal in 1832, the novel follows land labourer Coll Coyle as he suffers the consequences of a single ill-judged act of rash violence. It’s a compelling tale, not least because of the power of the language, which put me in mind of Cormac McCarthy’s early work. There’s also a kind of epic, cinematic sweep to the events, which shouldn’t really be surprising – Paul Lynch was for many moons the film critic for the Sunday Tribune.
  I know Paul, so you may want to take my opinion with a pinch of salt, but I think RED SKY is a terrific piece of work. I particularly liked the tone, which seems to be pitched somewhere between the bleak fatalism of noir and the Fate-hounded tales of classical Greek tragedy.
  So there it is. RED SKY IN MORNING by Paul Lynch: it’s early days still, but I’d imagine it’ll be hailed as one of the most impressive Irish debuts of the year.

The Morning Redness In The West

Paul Lynch is a name you’ll be hearing quite a bit of in 2013, methinks. His debut novel, RED SKY IN MORNING (Quercus) won’t be published until April 25th, but it’s already creating something of a word of mouth buzz. Quoth the blurb elves:

Spring 1832: Donegal, north west Ireland. Coll Coyle wakes to a blood dawn and a day he does not want to face. The young father stands to lose everything on account of the cruel intentions of his landowner’s heedless son. Although reluctant, Coll sets out to confront his trouble. And so begins his fall from the rain-soaked, cloud-swirling Eden, and a pursuit across the wild bog lands of Donegal. Behind him is John Faller - a man who has vowed to hunt Coll to the ends of the earth - in a pursuit that will stretch to an epic voyage across the Atlantic, and to greater tragedy in the new American frontier. RED SKY IN MORNING is a dark tale of oppression bathed in sparkling, unconstrained imagery. A compassionate and sensitive exploration of the merciless side of man and the indifference of nature, it is both a mesmerizing feat of imagination and a landmark piece of fiction.

  Nice. Meanwhile, the early word is very positive indeed. To wit:

‘Classic storytelling, rough and haunted people and the times that made them, powerfully conjured, written in language that demands attention. Lynch is bardic, given to sly and inspired word selections, with his own sprung rhythms and angled, stark musicality.’ - Daniel Woodrell

‘This book makes the literary synapses spark and burn. Forged in his own new and wonderful language, Paul Lynch reaches to the root, branch and bole of things, and unfurls a signal masterpiece.’ - Sebastian Barry

  So there you have it. RED SKY IN MORNING by Paul Lynch - mark it down in your calendars, people …